RIYADMEDIA

Plans are finally in motion for a railway that runs from China to Europe through Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, after being on the table for two decades. Some Central Asian residents remain skeptical of the project, while others anticipate it will be an economic boon for the region.

The deal, reached in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, during the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s summit last month, cements a feasibility study that requires the transportation authorities of all countries involved to complete an assessment of the project by the middle of next year, then begin construction.

The new route, costing roughly $4.5 billion, would be an alternative to China’s current dependence on a route through Russia and Kazakhstan for overland transit to Europe. That route has become politically problematic because of Western sanctions on Russia prompted by President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.

Central Asian skeptics

Some Central Asian residents say their country has been included as a means to an end for other countries and are doubtful the latest rail project will benefit them.

“Central Asians have always waved at containers carrying someone else’s freight elsewhere,” said a young attendant on Uzbekistan’s Afrosiyob domestic express train who calls himself Aziz and does not want to use his real name.

“Another document taking us nowhere,” said Hikmat, a 33-year-old trader in the Southern Uzbek city of Samarkand, who prefers not to use his last name, fearing his criticism could hurt his partnerships in Kyrgyzstan and China. “What are we getting from this? Weren’t the governments already studying feasibility?”

VOA heard similar cynicism from residents in Kyrgyzstan. Analyst Sovetbek Zikirov pointed out that many in Central Asia believe China is more interested in shipping its products through the region than in investing locally or creating jobs.

“It’s not seeking more presence in our market,” Zikirov told VOA.

Hopeful rail supporters

The adoption of a memorandum on September 14, however, has renewed hope among some officials in Central Asia that a new railway will connect their goods to faraway markets, and some urge Bishkek to move faster.

Kyrgyz observer Bektemir Ziyadinov wrote via Facebook that infrastructure projects would elevate the country’s image and credibility.

“This railway is not just a great opportunity for Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan but will create an awesome alternative for China, which currently transits goods mainly via Kazakhstan,” said Zilola Yunusova, head of the Uzbek Foreign Ministry’s research unit. “This new route is 900 kilometers shorter. Such new corridors are especially relevant now when big economies face global supply chains and pandemic bottlenecks.”

Yunusova, whose center tackles regional projects, told VOA the deal “demonstrates strong political resolve. Now, the governments will consider each other’s proposals and come to agreement on the route and investments.”

She admitted that the document lacks details but said it commits to steps for the next year so that construction can begin in 2023.

Uzbek, Kyrgyz, and Chinese officials stress that their governments are eager to collaborate on mapping and funding of the railway project.

“We all know China is very interested to realize this project as part of its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI),” Yunusova said.

Kyrgyz Transportation and Communications Minister Erkinbek Osoyev, who signed the deal, said Kyrgyz specialists are already working with Chinese counterparts.

“The deadline for the technical and economic assessment is no later than June 1, 2023,” a September 14 Kyrgyz statement noted. “The sides are to equally share the expenses for the technical and economic justification of the project.”

China’s Foreign Ministry calls the agreement “important progress in the construction of a major transport route in the Eurasian continent.”

For Bishkek and Tashkent, this “faster and shorter” railway should emerge as a southern branch of the Eurasian continental link, opening access to Southeast Asia, Western Asian and Middle Eastern markets while delivering Chinese goods to Kyrgyzstan and other parts of Central Asia en route to Europe.

Tashkent and Bishkek put high hopes on the railway’s social-economic impact, such as expanding domestic transportation services and infrastructure.

The idea for this railway has been under discussion for 20 years, but never took concrete shape until about 2018 when the leaderships in Tashkent and Bishkek started pushing for it together.

China-Central Asia relations

China’s state media Global Times quoted Zhao Huirong at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences who said the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway project could be “one of the most important multilateral economic cooperation projects yielded by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,” although the deal only includes three of its eight members.

“More trade and logistic collaboration will develop in Xinjiang after the railway is put into operation. … The rail line is conducive to expanding the exports of the two countries’ agricultural and mineral products,” Zhao told the Global Times.

US concerns

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Donald Lu said Washington is closely watching Chinese engagement with Central Asia.

“When I served as ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, I witnessed local resentment of the Chinese presence, which was often seen as exploitative, corrupt, and non-transparent,” Lu told the House Foreign Affairs Committee on September 14. “There exists a genuine fear that Belt and Road Initiative loans are creating unsustainable debt. There is fear that Chinese workers are displacing jobs for Central Asian workers.”

Lu saw significant concern in Central Asia that Beijing’s ambitions are not purely commercial.

“Fighting corrupt PRC business deals is sensitive and dangerous work. Our embassy in Kyrgyzstan has spent years working to shine a light on PRC organized crime activity, in league with former Kyrgyz corrupt officials, that robs the people of Central Asia of billions in customs revenue each year.”

The Chinese embassy has not responded to VOA’s request for comment, but Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin has said, “The so-called ‘Chinese debt trap’ is a lie made up by the U.S. and some other Western countries to deflect responsibility and blame.”

In June, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi highlighted the agreements made in the regional foreign ministers’ meeting in Kazakhstan for “win-win results.” Wang said important points at the meeting included “connectivity,” “the safe and stable operation of the China-Europe freight train,” improved customs and ensuring a “continuous supply chain.”

Hopeful skeptics

Many Uzbeks, while skeptical about the construction of a railway that has been in discussion for so many years, do hope to benefit if the cargo route becomes reality.

As Aziz, the young train attendant, remarked on the way to Samarkand, “East or West, we want the best, because we deserve the best. We want businesses transiting their goods to stop and shop here. These freight trains should finally start carrying our goods as well.”
…

Turkish journalists groups on Tuesday protested a draft law the government says is aimed at combating fake news and disinformation but which critics denounce as yet another attempt to stifle freedom of expression.

Parliament was set to debate a 40-article piece of legislation that amends multiple laws governing press, advertising and social media. The most controversial change is an amendment to the press law that would criminalize the spreading of “fake news” with a sentence of up to three years in prison.

Critics, including opposition lawmakers and nongovernmental organizations, say the law is too vague and could potentially be abused by the government to further crack down on independent journalism, especially media that has developed on the internet.

The government already controls most major news outlets and has been named among the world’s biggest jailers of journalists.

Representatives of various Turkish journalist associations wearing black face masks gathered outside parliament in Ankara, urging legislators not to pass the law, which was submitted to parliament in May.

“As journalists, in line with our responsibility to society, we once again warn both legislators and the public: If this law is implemented in this form, there will be no freedom of press, expression and communication in our country,” said Kemal Aktas, head of the Parliamentary Correspondents Association.

Meanwhile, main opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu claimed in a speech on Tuesday that Erdogan’s government, which faces elections in June, introduced the changes to prevent the dissemination of allegations of corruption against the government.

International media freedom organizations have also called for the dismissal of the bill, saying it puts millions of internet users at risk of criminal action for online posts the government disagrees with, could become a tool “for harassing journalists and activists” and could lead to self-censorship.

Disinformation is an important issue and needs to be combated but not at the price of restricting journalists’ rights and the public’s rights of freedom of expression,” the groups, including PEN and the Committee to Protect Journalists, said in June.

Article 29 of the bill is an amendment to the Turkish penal code mandating one to three years in prison for spreading information that is “contrary to the truth” about Turkey’s domestic and international security, public order and health for the alleged purpose of causing “public worry, fear and panic.” The sentence can be increased by a half if that crime is committed by an anonymous user or as part of an organization.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has argued for a law to combat disinformation, saying fake news and rising “digital fascism” is a national and global security issue.

The proposal, put forth by his ruling Justice and Development Party and its nationalist ally, says fake news and its dissemination or disinformation pose a “serious threat” by preventing people to access the truth, while also undermining freedom of expression and information by “abusing certain freedoms.”

The proposal also says the internet allows ill-intentioned users to hide their identities for illegal acts and posts like attacks, slander, hate speech and discrimination, therefore requiring regulation. It says the state has the obligation to protect rights and freedoms, especially for people whose rights were violated online.
…

Former German chancellor Angela Merkel has won the prestigious Nansen Award from the U.N. refugee agency, for providing a haven for more than 1.2 million refugees and asylum seekers fleeing violence and persecution in Syria.

Angela Merkel welcomed the desperate people at the height of the Syrian conflict in 2015 and 2016, when other countries were turning their backs on them.

In announcing the award, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said Merkel displayed great moral and political courage by helping more than a million refugees survive and rebuild their lives.

UNHCR spokesman Matthew Saltmarsh says Merkel has helped to highlight the plight of refugees globally. He says she has shown what can be achieved when politicians work to find solutions to challenging situations rather than shifting responsibility to others.

“As well as protecting people forced to flee war, persecution and human rights abuses, the former chancellor was the driving force behind Germany’s collective efforts to receive them and to help them integrate into their new homes through education and training programs, employment schemes, and labor market integration,” said Saltmarsh.

The award is named after Norwegian explorer and humanitarian Fridtjof Nansen. It is given to an individual, group or organization that has gone above and beyond the call of duty to protect refugees.

The award selection committee also has honored four regional winners. They are an all-volunteer refugee firefighting group in Mauritania in West Africa; a refugee support cacao cooperative in Costa Rica in the Americas; humanitarian organization Meikse Myanmar that assists internally displaced people among others in Asia and the Pacific; and an Iraqi gynecologist who provides medical and psychological care to Yazidi girls and women in the Middle East and North Africa.

The Nansen award will be presented to Merkel and the four regional winners at a ceremony in Geneva October 10. For Merkel, the award carries a cash prize of $150,000. Each of the regional laureates will receive $50,000.
…

Afghanistan’s National Institute of Music has performed its first concert in its new home of Lisbon, Portugal. Members of the exiled school are determined to keep Afghan music alive even though they can’t play in their homeland. VOA’s Farkhunda Paimani and Munaza Shaheed attended the concert in Lisbon and filed this report narrated by Amy Katz. Camera: Nawid Orokzai
…

Albanian authorities Monday denied the country’s police system was hacked after local media reported that data on people being investigated for crimes was released from an Iranian hacking group.

Albanian media reported a leaked file with a list of suspected people, from allegedly the police database, who are being probed on different crimes.

Ervin Karamuco, a criminology professor, was quoted in social media as saying a channel called Homeland Justice had published 1.7 gigabytes of criminal data from the Memex police system.

State police denied its Memex system was damaged but urged local media not to publish data from hackers.

Interior Minister Bledi Cuci said that list had not come from the criminal police database. He said Microsoft and the FBI were helping Albanian authorities recuperate the affected systems.

Speaking at the Parliament, Prime Minister Edi Rama said the list aimed at creating social disturbances by issuing a “photo-edited list mixing criminals with politicians, with journalists.”

Last month Albania cut diplomatic ties with Iran over a July 15 cyberattack that temporarily shut down numerous Albanian government digital services and websites. Rama called the disruption an act of “state aggression.”

After Tirana severed ties with Tehran, a second cyberattack from the same Iranian source struck an information system that records Albanian border entries and exits, creating delays for travelers.

NATO, the United States and the European Union denounced the attack and supported Albania’s move to cut diplomatic ties with Tehran. The U.S. government-imposed sanctions on Iran’s intelligence agency and its leadership in response to the July cyberattack.

Albania, a NATO member, is being helped by the alliance, the U.S. and the EU to investigate and install better cyber defenses.
…

A Russian court on Monday set October 25 as the date for American basketball star Brittney Griner’s appeal against her nine-year prison sentence for drug possession. 

Griner, an eight-time all-star center with the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury and a two-time Olympic gold medalist, was convicted August 4 after police said they found vape canisters containing cannabis oil in her luggage at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. 

The Moscow region court said it will hear her appeal. 

Griner admitted that she had the canisters in her luggage but testified that she had inadvertently packed them in haste and that she had no criminal intent. Her defense team presented written statements that she had been prescribed cannabis to treat pain. 

Her February arrest came at a time of heightened tensions between Moscow and Washington, just days before Russia sent troops into Ukraine. At the time, Griner, recognized as one of the greatest players in WNBA history, was returning to Russia, where she played during the U.S. league’s offseason. 

The nine-year sentence was close to the maximum of 10 years, and Griner’s lawyers argued after the conviction that the punishment was excessive. They said in similar cases defendants have received an average sentence of about five years, with about a third of them granted parole. 

Before her conviction, the U.S. State Department declared Griner to be “wrongfully detained” — a charge that Russia has sharply rejected. 

Reflecting the growing pressure on the Biden administration to do more to bring Griner home, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken took the unusual step of revealing publicly in July that Washington had made a “substantial proposal” to get Griner home, along with Paul Whelan, an American serving a 16-year sentence in Russia for espionage. 

Blinken didn’t elaborate, but The Associated Press and other news organizations have reported that Washington has offered to exchange Griner and Whelan for Viktor Bout, a Russian arms dealer who is serving a 25-year sentence in the U.S. and once earned the nickname the “merchant of death.” 

The White House said it has not yet received a productive response from Russia to the offer. 

Russian diplomats have refused to comment on the U.S. proposal and urged Washington to discuss the matter in confidential talks, avoiding public statements. 

U.S. President Joe Biden met last month with Cherelle Griner, the wife of Brittney Griner, as well as the player’s agent, Lindsay Colas. Biden also sat down separately with Elizabeth Whelan, Paul Whelan’s sister. 

The White House said after the meetings that the president stressed to the families his “continued commitment to working through all available avenues to bring Brittney and Paul home safely.” 

The Biden administration carried out a prisoner swap in April, with Moscow releasing Marine veteran Trevor Reed in exchange for the U.S. releasing a Russian pilot, Konstantin Yaroshenko, convicted in a drug trafficking conspiracy. 

 
…

U.N. economists warn the monetary and fiscal policies of advanced economies risk plunging the world into a recession worse than the financial crisis of 2008. UNCTAD, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development has issued its annual Trade and Development Report 2022.

The authors of the report warn the world is teetering on the edge of a recession due to bad policy decisions by advanced economies, combined with cascading crises resulting from climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the war in Ukraine.

They project this year’s global growth rate of 2.5 percent will slow to 2.2 percent in 2023. This, they say, will leave a cumulative shortfall of more than $17 trillion, close to 20 percent of the world’s income.

The report finds the slowdown is hitting countries in all regions, especially developing countries. It says growth rates in the poorer countries are expected to drop below three percent, damaging development and employment prospects.

UNCTAD Secretary-General Rebeca Grynspan says middle-income countries in Latin America, as well as low-income countries in Africa, will register some of the sharpest slowdowns this year.

“In Africa, an additional 58 million people will fall into extreme poverty in 2022 adding to the 55 million already pushed into extreme poverty by the COVID-19 pandemic,” Grynspan said.

Grynspan says developing countries are facing alarming levels of debt distress and under investment. She says 46 developing countries are severely exposed to multiple economic shocks. She adds another 48 countries are seriously exposed, heightening the threat of a global debt crisis.

“So, countries that were showing signs of debt distress before COVID are taking some of the biggest hits, with climate shocks further threatening economic stability,” Grynspan said. “This is increasing the threat of a global debt crisis. So, countries urgently need real debt relief.”

Grynspan says there is still time to step back from the edge of recession if countries use available tools to calm inflation and support vulnerable groups.

Among its recommendations, UNCTAD urges a more pragmatic strategy that deploys strategic price controls, windfall taxes, anti-trust measures and tighter regulations on commodities speculation.
…

Prominent Russian journalist Ksenia Sobchak faces a criminal investigation over a story that police suspect was “fake,” state news agency TASS reported on Monday, citing an unidentified source in law enforcement. 

Sobchak, whose late father was the mayor of St. Petersburg in the 1990s and worked closely with Vladimir Putin, hosts a YouTube channel with over 3 million subscribers. She also founded a popular Telegram account which regularly shares stories critical of Russia’s mobilization efforts. 

TASS reported that Sobchak’s story related to “state funding of festivals” and that she could be charged under an article of Russian law that provides for three-year jail sentences. 

Neither Sobchak, 40, nor representatives of her news site immediately responded to a Reuters request for comment on the TASS report. 

Sobchak has so far avoided prosecution, but authorities have scrutinized her in the past for sharing so-called “LGBT propaganda” and declaring that Crimea was still Ukrainian after its annexation by Russia in 2014. 

Since invading Ukraine in February, Russia has cracked down on independent media and prosecuted numerous journalists for spreading “fake” news about what it calls its “special military operation.” 

 
…

Ukrainian forces made further gains Monday in the Kherson region in the country’s south, adding to their gains in the east in recent days as they push a counteroffensive against Russia.

Russia-installed officials in Kherson said Ukraine’s military had recaptured some settlements in Kherson.

The region is one of four that Russia illegally annexed last week.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly address Sunday that his forces in Kherson had liberated the settlements of Arkhanhelske and Myroliubivka.

The developments in Kherson followed Sunday’s announcement by Ukrainian forces that they had retaken full control of Lyman, the eastern logistics hub that is also within territory Russia claimed last week was its own.

“Lyman is fully cleared,” Zelenskyy declared in a short video clip on his Telegram channel.

Russia did not comment Sunday on the fate of Lyman but said Saturday that its troops were retreating from the area because it feared Ukrainian forces were about to encircle them. Russia captured Lyman in May and had used it as a logistics and transportation hub for its operations in the north of the Donetsk region.

Russia’s loss of Lyman was its biggest battlefield defeat since Ukrainian forces last month swept through the Kharkiv region in northeastern Ukraine, pushing Russian forces back toward their border.

In addition to claiming the annexations rejected by Ukraine and its western allies, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered late last month the mobilization of 300,000 reservists to bolster Russia’s forces.

The order sparked protests in some areas of Russia and long lines at borders as people fled.

The governor of Russia’s Khabarovsk region said Monday that the military commissar in the region was removed from his post after half of the personnel who were mobilized did not meet draft criteria and were sent home.

The governor said in a Telegram video that the commissar’s removal would not affect the overall mobilization plan.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
…

Reformists who ran on fighting corruption and clientelism in public office appeared set to win an important race in Bosnia’s elections Sunday that could give them greater sway over the direction of the country which has never fully recovered from its 1992-95 sectarian war and remains divided along ethnic lines.  

The first preliminary results released by Bosnia’s central election commission early Monday showed cooperation-prone contenders Denis Becirovic and Zeljko Komsic on course to win respective Bosniak and Croat seats in the tripartite presidency. However, the reformists were likely to be joined by Zeljka Cvijanovic from the strongest Bosnian Serb party – the secessionist and staunchly pro-Russian SNSD.  

Moscow has often been accused by the West of seeking to destabilize the country and the rest of the Balkans through its Serb allies in the region, and the Sunday ballot was held amid growing fears the Kremlin might attempt to reignite the conflict in Bosnia to deflect attention from its campaign in Ukraine.  

The election included contests for the three members of Bosnia’s shared, multiethnic presidency, the president of one of its two highly autonomous parts, and parliament deputies at different, in part overlapping, levels of governance.  

Bosnia’s institutional set-up, often described as one of the most complicated in the world, was introduced by a U.S.-brokered peace agreement that ended the war in the 1990s between its three main ethnic groups – Muslim Bosniaks, Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats. Under the terms of the agreement, Bosnia was divided into two highly independent entities – one run by Serbs and the other shared by Bosniaks and Croats – which have broad autonomy but are linked by joint, multi-ethnic institutions. All countrywide actions require consensus from all three ethnic groups. 

If the preliminary results hold, Cvijanovic will take over the post from her political party’s boss, Milorad Dodik, who chose to run for the president of Bosnia’s Serb-run part rather than seek a second term in the shared, countrywide presidency.  

Two contenders claim victory

Both Dodik, and his main contender, Jelena Trivic, proclaimed victory in the race for the Bosnian Serb president. Their claims will be tested later Monday, when the election commission is expected to announce preliminary results of the presidential ballot for Bosnia’s Serb-run part and the races for parliament deputies at the state, entity and regional levels.  

Prior to the polls, analysts predicted that the long-entrenched nationalists of all ethnic stripes, who have enriched cronies and ignored the needs of the people, will remain dominant in the legislatures at all levels, largely because the sectarian post-war system of governance leaves pragmatic, reform-minded Bosnians with little incentive to vote. Election turnout on Sunday was 50% or over 2 percentage points down from the 2018 general election.  

Overseer amends electoral law

On Sunday, shortly after the vote count begun, Bosnia’s international overseer, Christian Schmidt, announced in a YouTube video that he was amending the country’s electoral law “to ensure functionality and timely implementation of election results.” Schmidt assured citizens in the video that the changes “will in no way affect” the votes cast on Sunday.  

The 1995 peace agreement gave broad powers to the international high representative, the post currently held by Schmidt, including the ability to impose laws and to dismiss officials and civil servants who undermine the country’s fragile post-war ethnic balance. 

The changes imposed by Schmidt will affect the size of the parliament of the Bosniak-Croat part of the country, and prevent blockades of the formation of its government.  
…

Greece wants to have a constructive dialogue with Turkey based on international law but its Aegean neighbor must halt its unprecedented escalation of provocations, the Greek foreign minister said Sunday.

The two countries — North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies but historic foes — have been at odds for decades over a range of issues, including where their continental shelves start and end, overflights in the Aegean Sea and a divided Cyprus.

“It is up to Turkey to choose if it will come to such a dialogue or not, but the basic ingredient must be a de-escalation,” Nikos Dendias told the Proto Thema newspaper in an interview.

Last month, the European Union voiced concern over statements by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan accusing Greece, an EU member, of occupying demilitarized islands in the Aegean and saying Turkey was ready to “do what is necessary” when the time came.

“The one responsible for a de-escalation is the one causing the escalation, which is Turkey,” Dendias said.

He blamed Ankara for increased provocations with a rhetoric of false and legally baseless claims, “even personal insults.”

Turkey has sharply increased its overflights and violations of Greek airspace, Dendias told the paper, adding that its behavior seems to be serving a “revisionist narrative” that it promotes consistently.

He said Turkish claims that Greece cannot be an equal interlocutor diplomatically, politically and militarily violates the basic rule of foreign relations – the principle of equality among nations.

“It is an insulting approach that ranks various countries as more or less equal,” Dendias said.
…

Pope Francis has called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to stop “this spiral of violence and death” over the war in Ukraine.

Francis’s remarks, made on Sunday in his weekly public prayer on St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican, were some of the strongest he has made since the February 24 invasion.

“My appeal is addressed first of all to the president of the Russian Federation, begging him to stop, also for the love of his people, this spiral of violence and death,” Francis said.

“On the other hand, saddened by the immense suffering of the Ukrainian population following the aggression suffered, I direct an equally confident appeal to the president of Ukraine to be open to serious peace proposals,” he said.

The Roman Catholic leader also decried the growing risk of nuclear war, calling it “absurd.”

“I deeply regret the serious situation that has arisen in recent days, with further actions contrary to the principles of international law,” he said. “In fact, it increases the risk of a nuclear escalation, to the point of fearing uncontrollable and catastrophic consequences worldwide.”

The pope’s comments came two days after Putin gave a fiery Kremlin speech in which he announced Russia was annexing four regions of Ukraine that are partially occupied by Russian forces.

In the September 30 speech, Putin also made veiled threats about using nuclear weapons in the conflict, echoing earlier remarks in which he warned the West “this is not a bluff.”

The Kremlin had no immediate reaction to the pope’s comments.
…

The center-right New Unity party of Latvian Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins won Saturday’s election, according to provisional results, with its 19% of the vote putting him in a position to head another coalition government.

The results — with 91% of districts counted — mean Latvia should remain a leading voice alongside its Baltic neighbors Lithuania and Estonia in pushing the European Union for a decisive stance against Russia.

Karins’ party was again the party with the most support following the election. Members of the current coalition were on track to receive 42 seats in the 100-seat parliament, so Karins needs to draft additional allies to stay as a prime minister.

As many as nine parties won sufficient votes to gain seats in parliament.

After a campaign dominated by security concerns following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Karins told Reuters he will be working to craft a coalition of like-minded parties.

“I am convinced that we will be able find such a solution,” he said early Sunday.

“First and foremost on everyone’s minds is how we all get through the winter, not only in Latvia but throughout the EU, and that we all remain united behind Ukraine, and do not waiver in the face of difficulties for us,” said Karins.

The first Latvian head of government to serve through a full four-year term, Karins, a 57-year-old dual U.S. and Latvian citizen, has benefited from his Moscow policy, which included restricting the entry of Russian citizens traveling from Russia and Belarus.

“I see no chance that any government in Latvia will stop supporting Ukraine — this is not a view of a small group of politicians, this is the view of our society,” said Karins.

But his victory could widen a rift between the country’s Latvian majority and its Russian-speaking minority over their place in society, amid widespread national anger over Moscow’s actions in Ukraine.
…

Bosnians headed to the polls Sunday to vote in general elections following a campaign season marked by threats of secession, political infighting, and fears of future turmoil as ethnic tensions in the country grow.

Voters are casting ballots in a dizzying number of contests, including for the three members of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency, the deputies of the central parliament and a string of local races.

Polls opened at 7 a.m. local time (5:00 GMT).

Nearly three decades after war ravaged the Balkan country, Bosnia continues to be burdened by its ethnic divisions.

The Balkan state has been governed by a dysfunctional administrative system created by the 1995 Dayton Agreement that succeeded in ending the conflict in the 1990s, but largely failed in providing a framework for the country’s political development.

Bosnia remains partitioned between a Serb entity — the Republika Srpska (RS) — and a Muslim-Croat federation connected by a weak central government.

In the war’s wake, ethnic political parties have long exploited the country’s divisions in a bid to maintain power.

“I hope for nothing. I vote because that is the only thing I can do as an individual,” said Amra Besic, a 57-year-old economist, as she cast her ballot in Sarajevo.

Coalition clash

In the run-up to Sunday’s vote, the country has been torn between secessionist Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats demanding greater autonomy and electoral reforms.

The country’s Muslim Bosniaks will also face a choice of voting for a disparate, 11-party coalition that is trying to unseat the rule of the mainstream SDA.

The SDA is led by Bakir Izetbegovic — the son of the first president of independent Bosnia — and has largely dominated the political scene in the country for decades.

Many voters say that the lack of young candidates offering fresh ideas has left them largely uninspired on the eve of the elections.

“Most of the candidates that are running are the ones we have been watching for the last twenty years,” said Sara Djogic, a 21-year-old philosophy student in the capital, Sarajevo.

“There are not many who offer something new,” she added.

With little to no polling data available, analysts say incumbents and nationalist parties that have dominated the post-war political scene are likely to win many of the races.

The leader of Bosnia’s Serbs, Milorad Dodik, is seeking his third term as the president of the RS, after completing a stint in the tripartite presidency.

For the past year, Dodik has been stoking tensions with his frequent calls for Bosnia’s Serbs to separate even further from the country’s central institutions, earning him fresh sanctions from the U.S. in January.

Dodik’s primary challenger Jelena Trivic has vowed to crack down on corruption in the RS if elected.

“Our revenge will be the law,” Trivic said ahead of the polls.

Fears of turmoil

For the country’s Catholic Croats, political turmoil has also been brewing.

Ahead of the election, many Croats have been demanding electoral reforms with the leading nationalist party HDZ threatening to boycott the contest.

Their grievances are steeped in the vast numerical advantage held by Bosniaks in the Muslim-Croat federation, which has allowed Muslim voters to hold de-facto control over who can be elected to lead the Croats at the presidential level.

HDZ and other Croat parties have been calling for the creation of a new mechanism to allow the community to choose their own representatives to the presidency and upper house.

The move, however, has been fiercely opposed by the federation’s ruling Bosniak party.

With threats of fresh boycotts, fears are growing of potential turmoil after the polls if the incumbent Croat co-president Zeljko Komsic — who is widely reviled by all Croat parties that view him as a Bosniak proxy — is reelected.

The ever-present threats and vitriol have led some to skip the polling booth Sunday.

“I do not expect anything new after these elections. Everything will be the same,” said Mira Sladojevic, a pensioner in her 70s in Sarajevo.

“I haven’t voted for a long time,” she added.

The first wave of preliminary results is expected several hours after the polls close at 7 p.m. (19:00 GMT).
…

The Danish Energy Agency says one of two ruptured natural gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea appears to have stopped leaking natural gas.

The agency said on Twitter on Saturday that it had been informed by the company operating the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that pressure appears to have stabilized in the pipeline, which runs from Russia to Germany.

“This indicates that the leaking of gas in this pipeline has ceased,” the Danish Energy Agency said.

Undersea blasts that damaged the Nord Stream I and 2 pipelines this week have led to huge methane leaks. Nordic investigators said the blasts have involved several hundred pounds of explosives.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday accused the West of sabotaging the Russia-built pipelines, a charge vehemently denied by the United States and its allies.

The U.S.-Russia clashes continued later at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council in New York called by Russia on the pipelines attacks and as Norwegian researchers published a map projecting that a huge plume of methane from the damaged pipelines will travel over large swaths of the Nordic region.

Speaking Friday in Moscow, Putin claimed that “Anglo-Saxons” in the West have turned from imposing sanctions on Russia to “terror attacks,” sabotaging the pipelines in what he described as an attempt to “destroy the European energy infrastructure.”

In Washington, U.S. President Joe Biden dismissed Putin’s pipeline claims as outlandish.

“It was a deliberate act of sabotage. And now the Russians are pumping out disinformation and lies. We will work with our allies to get to the bottom (of) precisely what happened,” Biden promised. “Just don’t listen to what Putin’s saying. What he’s saying we know is not true.”

U.S. officials said the Putin claim was trying to shift attention from his annexation Friday of parts of Ukraine.

“We’re not going to let Russia’s disinformation distract us or the world from its transparently fraudulent attempt to annex sovereign Ukrainian territory,” White House National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said Friday.

European nations, which have been reeling under soaring energy prices caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, have noted that it is Russia, not Europe, that benefits from chaos in the energy markets and spiking prices for energy.

The U.S. has long opposed to the two pipelines and had repeatedly urged Germany to halt them, saying they increased Europe’s energy dependence on Russia and decreased its security. Since the war in Ukraine began in February, Russia has cut back supplies of natural gas sent to Europe to heat homes, generate electricity and run factories. European leaders have accused Putin of using “energy blackmail” to divide them in their strong support for Ukraine.

The attacks on the pipelines have prompted energy companies and European governments to beef up security around energy infrastructure.
…

European Union leaders will discuss the security of crucial infrastructure when they meet in Prague next week following damage to the Nord Stream pipelines that many in the West have said was caused by sabotage.

“Sabotage of Nord Stream pipelines is a threat to the EU,” Charles Michel, who chairs meetings of EU leaders, said in a tweet Saturday after talks with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen in Brussels.

“We are determined to secure our critical infrastructure. Leaders will address this at the upcoming summit in Prague,” he wrote.

The leaders of EU member states leaders are scheduled to meet in the Czech capital on Friday.

Meanwhile, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg also met with Frederiksen in Brussels “to address the sabotage” on the pipelines, he said on Twitter.

“NATO allies will continue our close cooperation on resilience [and the] protection of critical infrastructure,” Stoltenberg wrote.

NATO earlier voiced “deep concern” over the damage sustained by the Nord Stream pipelines in the Baltic Sea, calling the incidents “deliberate, reckless, and irresponsible acts of sabotage.”

Three leaks — two in the Danish zone and one in the Swedish zone — were discovered last week in the two major Russian underwater pipelines designed to ship natural gas to Germany, while Sweden on Thursday said its coast guard had found a fourth leak.

On Saturday, a Nord Stream 2 pipeline spokesperson told Agence France-Presse the pipeline is no longer leaking under the Baltic Sea because an equilibrium has been reached between the gas and water pressure. Information on the status of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline leak, which was significantly larger, was not immediately available, AFP reported.

The incidents come amid rising tensions between Europe and Russia over the war in Ukraine.

While both NATO and the European Union say the leaks were caused by sabotage, they have so far refrained from directly pinning the blame on Russia.

Some material for this article came from Reuters, Agence France-Presse and dpa. 
…

With ethnic divisions growing deeper, Bosnia will hold general elections Sunday amid secession threats and fears of fresh political turmoil nearly three decades after war ravaged the Balkan nation. 

The country is torn between secessionist Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats demanding greater autonomy, while Muslim Bosniaks calling for a more egalitarian state appear to be chasing little more than a pipedream.  

For more than two decades, the impoverished Balkan state has been governed by a dysfunctional administrative system born out of the 1995 Dayton Agreement.

And while the accords may have succeeded in ending the war in the 1990s, the country has withered amid political paralysis ever since.

Analysts have warned that Bosnia is sinking ever deeper into troubled waters with divisions along ethnic lines appearing to grow even further on the eve of elections. 

“Bosnia-Herzegovina is experiencing the most serious political crisis since the signing of the peace agreement,” Ranko Mavrak, a Sarajevo-based political analyst, told AFP. 

“The ethnic divisions are so deep that they are now a real danger to Bosnia’s survival and its integrity,” he added.

Bosnia is divided between a Serb entity — the Republika Srpska (RS) — and a Muslim-Croat federation linked by a weak central government.

With Bosnia’s three main groups rarely mixing in the wake of the war, ethnic political parties have long exploited the country’s fault lines in a bid to maintain power, driving hundreds of thousands abroad in search of better opportunities. 

“It’s a beautiful, rich country and we could move forward with even a minimum of understanding,” said Salko Hasanefendic, 70, a business owner from Sarajevo. 

“If we raise our children today in such a nationalist context, we can only expect to have new nationalists in 40 years,” he told AFP.

Amid the gloom, voters will cast ballots in a dizzying array of contests Sunday, including for the three members of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency, the deputies of the central parliament and a raft of local races in the two separate entities. 

With little to no polling data to rely on, analysts say incumbents and nationalist parties are likely to dominate many of the contests, including longtime Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, who is running for the presidency of the RS.

For months, Dodik has been stoking tensions amid frequent calls for Bosnia’s Serbs to separate even further from the country’s central institutions.  

“This situation is like two brothers who don’t like each other,” Rajko, a retiree and Dodik supporter who did disclose his surname, told AFP before a recent campaign rally.

“It is better that they do not live together,” he added, echoing a common refrain said by Dodik.

Amid the calls for secession, there are many who appear happy to see their Serb countrymen leave.

“Dodik and those like him can go to another country that they find more beautiful,” said Bosnia’s former co-president Bakir Izetbegovic during a recent rally.

Izetbegovic— the son of the first president of independent Bosnia—is running for a third term as the country’s Bosniak president but is facing stiff competition from 46-year-old history professor Denis Becirovic.  

Backed by 11 opposition parties, Becirovic is vowing to fight for a “pro-European and united” Bosnia.

To add to the growing divide, many of the country’s Catholic Croats have been pleading for greater autonomy or electoral reforms during the run-up to the polls, with the leading nationalist party HDZ threatening to boycott the contest for months.

Thanks to their vast numerical advantage in the Muslim-Croat federation, Bosniaks hold de facto control over who can be elected to lead the Croats at the presidential level.

HDZ and other Croat parties have been calling for a mechanism to allow the community to appoint their own representatives to the presidency and upper house — a move fiercely opposed by the federation’s ruling Bosniak party.

Fears are growing of potential turmoil after the polls if the incumbent Croat co-president Zeljko Komsic — who is widely reviled by all Croat parties — is reelected following repeated threats by nationalists, who say they are prepared to widen boycotts at government institutions.

“At the moment, there is no sign the situation will stabilize in Bosnia,” said Mavrak, the analyst. “There is no indication at the moment that it is possible to reach a compromise.” 
…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday renewed his threat to block the NATO bids of Sweden and Finland, saying he would not give his approval until the two Nordic countries kept promises he said were made to Ankara.

“Until the promises made to our country are upheld, we will maintain our principled position,” Erdogan said in a speech to parliament in Ankara.

“We are closely following whether the promises made by Sweden and Finland are kept or not, and of course, the final decision will be up to our great parliament,” he added without elaboration.

Ankara initially said it would veto the two countries’ membership in the Western alliance, with Erdogan accusing them of providing havens for Kurdish militants operating in Turkey and for promoting what he called “terrorism.”

Following negotiations, Erdogan said he would drop his objections but indicated he could still block their membership bids if they failed to follow through on promises, some of which were undisclosed.

Membership bids must be approved by all 30 NATO members. Only Hungary and Turkey have yet to send the membership bids to their parliaments for ratification.

The historic shifts by Sweden and Finland came in the face of Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine in February and other aggressive moves by the Kremlin in the region.

Public opinion in the Nordic countries quickly turned in favor of NATO membership following the invasion.

Some material for this report came from Agence France-Presse and Deutsche Presse-Agentur.
…

Poland, far from being overwhelmed by the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians seeking refuge from Russia’s invasion of their country, is seeing its economy grow, according to economists.

The latest available figures from early August show about half of the working-age people who fled Ukraine for Poland are now employed.

In an interview with VOA, World Bank economist Reena Badiani-Magnusson, who specializes in the region, called the employment statistics for the temporarily displaced people, or TDPs, released by the Polish government “impressive.”

Badiani-Magnusson quotes a National Bank of Poland study that found between 2013 and 2018, during the first wave of Ukrainian migration, the presence of Ukrainian migrants in the country had a .5% positive impact on growth.

“On top of that, we’ve done some analysis of the current crisis, and we find that should 500,000 Ukrainian displaced people be integrated into the labor market successfully, we anticipate a medium-term impact on the growth of 1.5%,” she said.

Experts interviewed by VOA said there are three main reasons why the “refugee crisis” quickly filled the Polish market with needed labor. First, Ukrainians who arrived in Poland, including many mothers with children, had high professional qualifications and wanted to work. Second, Polish authorities quickly removed most barriers to Ukrainian TDP employment. And third, the sizeable Ukrainian diaspora facilitated the adjustment and labor engagement of the newly arrived compatriots fleeing the war.

Ukrainians working below their qualifications

For many newly arrived Ukrainian women, says Ludmila Dymitrow, a coordinator at the Information Center for Foreigners in Krakow, low-skilled work is only the first step.

“We explain that even if you had a good job and a high status in your homeland, you could find it here, too, but start with something simpler. A good start can begin in different ways, even from the checkout in a store. Learn the language, and life will give you other opportunities.”

One of many Ukrainian TDPs in Krakow, Olena Kurta, a mother of two, cleans hotel rooms. She used to teach law in the city of Horlivka, in the Russia-supported so-called Donetsk People’s Republic in 2014, and later opened and ran a daycare in Kryvyi Rih.

“I want to learn the language and find another job. I haven’t decided what I want to do. I have to start everything from the beginning,” said Kurta.

Tatyana Potapova, another Ukrainian woman, came to Krakow from the village of Lyptsi near Kharkiv, captured by Russians in the early days of the invasion. In her 60s and a chemist by education and employment, she enrolled in Polish-language classes as soon as she arrived.

“I imagine that I can work as a concierge in some institution. It is my dream. I am willing even to work in a store, but preferably not in a grocery store,” said Potapova in an interview with VOA.

Polish authorities provide immediate job assistance

On March 12, 2022, the Polish parliament passed a law on assistance to Ukrainian citizens, which gave the TDPs from Ukraine the right to stay legally in Poland for 18 months and access its health care system, education, social services and labor market.

The government and local authorities assist Ukrainian TDPs in finding employment. For example, the provincial Employment Administration helps connect job seekers with employers. It also began some programs, available only to Polish citizens and Ukrainian TDPs, that included financing 85% of the cost of job training, said its director. 

The administration sent their representative to the Center for Foreigners, located in the Krakow shopping mall, to help job seekers find opportunities and apply for vacancies.

Badiani-Magnusson points to a comprehensive approach to facilitating access of Ukrainian women to the labor market.

“The Polish government and society need to be recognized and commended for their generous and open-armed support to the populations arriving, the speed and rapidity at which populations that wanted to work were able to have registered temporary protection” that provided services that allowed to integrate them into the labor market, said the economist.

Ukrainian diaspora helps new arrivals find jobs

Maciej Bukowski, president of the Warsaw-based research institute Wise-Europa, draws attention to another aspect – before the arrival of a new wave of TDPs after February 24, Ukrainians were already in Poland, arriving especially after 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea, and instigated and supported aggression in Donbas.

The presence of Ukrainians helped absorb the sudden and significant wave of new refugees from Ukraine.

Barriers for Ukrainians in the Polish labor market

Still, obstacles to the employment of the Ukrainian TDPs remain. The language barrier is one of them. Even though Ukrainian and Polish are linguistically close, it still takes time and effort to be able to speak Polish fluently.

The Zustricz Foundation, an organization of Ukrainians in Krakow, offers classes for Polish-language learners, one of the popular ways to assist Ukrainian TDPs.

A second barrier is the need to care for children. Almost half of those who arrived from Ukraine after February 24 and remained in Poland (600,000) are children.

Badiani-Magnusson of the World Bank points to the need to find employment that matches the qualifications of the Ukrainian job seekers. Zustricz Foundation founder Aleksandra Zapolska agrees – there is still a need to connect employers and job seekers, especially among the most qualified.

“In the medical field, there is a great need for nurses and doctors; for example, there is a shortage of psychiatrists. On the other hand, doctors do not fully know where to turn because not every hospital is interested at that moment; there is no such path for them to meet,” she explained.

The World Bank also says that Ukrainian entrepreneurs need help with adaptation to Polish legislation and access to finance. “You can imagine that you can have a very successful business in Ukraine, and you’d like to be able to bring those same skills into the Polish labor market,” says Badiani-Magnusson.

An uncertain outcome

Zapolska points to another problem – uncertainty about the future.

Will these people return to Ukraine? Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said Ukrainians will return with the liberation of Ukrainian territories; the critical moment here will be the liberation of Kherson. That is why, he said, it is essential to end the war in such a way that Russia cannot continue posing a threat to Ukrainian territories.

“Many Ukrainians do not know whether they will return, and their decision often changes,” said Zapolska.

According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), more than 7 million Ukrainian TDPs remain in European countries – 1.3 million in Poland. Since the start of the full-scale offensive, more than 6 million people have crossed the border from Ukraine to Poland.

VOA’s Georgian Service contributed to this report.
…

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said on Saturday it rejects Russia’s annexation of four regions in Ukraine, adding the decision is a “grave violation” of international law.

Turkey, a NATO member, has conducted a diplomatic balancing act since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24. Ankara opposes Western sanctions on Russia and has close ties with both Moscow and Kyiv, its Black Sea neighbors. It has also criticized.

Russia’s invasion and sent armed drones to Ukraine.

The Turkish ministry said on Saturday it had not recognized Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, adding that it rejects Russia’s decision to annex the four regions, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia.

“This decision, which constitutes a grave violation of the established principles of international law, cannot be accepted,” the ministry said.

“We reiterate our support to the resolution of this war, the severity of which keeps growing, based on a just peace that will be reached through negotiations,” it added.

Russian President Vladimir Putin proclaimed the annexation of the regions on Friday, promising Moscow would triumph in its “special military operation” even as he faced a potentially serious new military reversal.

His proclamation came after Russia held what it called referendums in occupied areas of Ukraine. Western governments and Kyiv said the votes breached international law and were coercive and non-representative.

The United States, Britain and Canada announced new sanctions in response.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Friday his country had submitted a fast-track application to join the NATO military alliance and that he would not hold peace talks with Russia while Putin was still president.
…

Ukraine’s nuclear power provider accused Russia on Saturday of “kidnapping” the head of Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, a facility now occupied by Russian troops.

Russian forces seized the director-general of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Ihor Murashov, around 4 p.m. Friday, Ukrainian state nuclear company Energoatom said.

Energoatom said Russian troops stopped Murashov’s car, blindfolded him and then took him to an undisclosed location.

“His detention by (Russia) jeopardizes the safety of Ukraine and Europe’s largest nuclear power plant,” said Energoatom President Petro Kotin said.

Kotin demanded Russia immediately release Murashov.

Russia did not immediately acknowledge seizing the plant director.

The Zaporizhzhia plant repeatedly has been caught in the crossfire of the war in Ukraine. Ukrainian technicians continued running it after Russian troops seized the power station. The plant’s last reactor was shut down in September amid ongoing shelling near the facility.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, which has staff at the plant, did not immediately acknowledge Energoatom’s claim of Murashov’s capture by the Russians.
…

Even after three months of captivity that included execution threats, physical torture, solitary confinement and food deprivation, it was the ride to freedom that nearly broke Alex Drueke, a U.S. military veteran released last week with nine other prisoners who went to help Ukraine fight off Russian invaders.

His hands were bound. His head was covered by a plastic bag, and the packing tape holding it in place was secured so tightly it it caused welts on his forehead. Drueke said he and fellow American prisoner Andy Huynh reached their limit in this state during the transit, which occurred in a series of vehicles from eastern Ukraine to an airport in Russia that was surrounded by armed guards.

“For all we went through and all the times we thought we might die, we accepted that we might die, we were ready to die when it came, that ride was the only time that each of us independently prayed for death just to get it over with,” Drueke told The Associated Press in an interview Friday.

“The mental and emotional torture of those last 24 hours in captivity, that was the worst,” he said.

Drueke, 40, is healing: The swelling is going down on his head and he’s trying to regain some of the 13.6 kilograms he figures he lost eating a poor diet. But awful memories remain, and he’s unsure what comes next aside from trying to focus attention on fellow prisoners who remain in Russian hands.

“The war has not ended,” he said, speaking at the home he shares with his mother and other relatives in Tuscaloosa.

Drueke and Huynh, a 27-year-old fellow military veteran from Alabama, were among hundreds of Americans who went to Ukraine early on to help in the fight against Russia.

On June 9, they were captured during what Drueke described as a reconnaissance mission associated with Ukraine’s international legion, composed of foreign volunteers.

“Everyone else managed to make it back to the base safe,” he said.

Russian soldiers took the two men to their camp, and then into Russia for “intensive interrogation.” While declining to go into specifics, Drueke said the treatment was brutal.

“Every one of our human rights were violated,” he said. “We were tortured.”

The men were taken back to Ukraine to a “black site” in Donetsk for nearly a month of additional interrogation, he said. They were eventually taken to an isolation cellblock within a former Ukrainian prison. There, Drueke and Huynh were forced to record propaganda statements for a Russian video camera with soldiers in the room.

“On the positive side, there were times they would put us in a closet, bound and blindfolded, … while they were waiting for whatever reporter to show up, and it gave Andy and I just a few seconds to whisper things back and forth to check in on each other,” he said. “It was the first time we had talked in weeks at that point.”

Eventually, after weeks of confinement that included multiple threats, it became apparent that something — either a release, a prison transfer or execution — was in the works, said Drueke, who joined the U.S. Army Reserve after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and served two tours in Iraq.

“We knew something was happening because our normal routine was being skewed and they were having us clear all of our personal stuff out of the cell,” he said.

But even then, the mental torture continued, he said. “One of the guards said a couple of times, ‘I’m pretty sure you guys are getting executed,’” he said.

Instead, they were part of a group of 10 men who were released Sept. 21 in a deal brokered by Saudi Arabia. The others who were released with them were from Croatia, Morocco, Sweden and the United Kingdom.

No one relaxed until the plane was in the air and an official from Saudi Arabia explained what was happening, he said. Landing in New York after a flight from Saudi Arabia, Drueke said he and Huynh were met by a Homeland Security official from an office that investigates war crimes.

Press aides with Homeland Security didn’t immediately return an email seeking comment, but the U.N. human rights investigators have said Ukrainian prisoners of war appear to be facing “systematic” mistreatment by Russian captors that includes torture.
…

The Biden administration Friday imposed fresh sanctions and export controls on entities and individuals inside and outside Russia that provide support to President Vladimir Putin’s government, following his annexation of four regions of Ukraine. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara reports.
…

The United States and Russia traded barbs and accusations at a U.N. Security Council meeting Friday about the apparent sabotage to a major gas pipeline that Russia uses to supply Europe.

Between Sept. 26 and 29, explosions caused four leaks in the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines that run along the floor of the Baltic Sea.

The United States, European Union, NATO and Russia all agree the damage and gas leaks point to sabotage, but they disagree about who is the likely perpetrator.

Russia requested the Security Council meeting to discuss the pipeline incident.

“It’s quite clear to us that carrying out of sabotage of such complexity and scale is beyond the power of ordinary terrorists,” Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said at the meeting. “We consider the actions to damage the gas pipelines to be deliberate sabotage against a crucial element of the Russian Federation’s energy infrastructure.”

He reiterated Kremlin talking points, saying that it could not have happened without the involvement of a state or state-controlled actors, and that Moscow would “certainly identify” the perpetrators.

“I hope, colleagues, that everyone in this room is aware of the dangerous brink to which those who committed this sabotage are leading us,” he said.

Assessing blame

Nebenzia implied that the United States had the most to gain by damaging the pipeline, and directly asked his U.S. counterpart if he could confirm that Washington was not involved.

“Let me be clear: The United States categorically denies any involvement in this incident, and we reject any assertions saying the contrary,” U.S. envoy Richard Mills responded.

Mills accused Russia of using the Security Council as a platform to launch conspiracy theories and disinformation. He noted that since Russia invaded Ukraine seven months ago, it has repeatedly damaged and destroyed civilian infrastructure there.

“If there is any country, perhaps, that has a record of doing what we are discussing here today, it’s not the United States,” Mills noted.

Some European officials and energy experts have suggested that Russia likely carried out the attacks to benefit from higher energy prices and to create more economic chaos in Europe for its support of Ukraine in fending off Russia’s war. But other officials urged caution in assessing blame until investigators determine what happened.

The damage to the pipelines happened off the shores of Sweden and Denmark. Ahead of Friday’s meeting, their ambassadors sent a joint letter to the Security Council president. They said at least two underwater detonations occurred on Sept. 26, damaging pipelines on Nord Stream 1 and 2 and causing “major leaks” of natural gas several hundred meters wide.

The cause was likely two massive explosions, “probably corresponding to an explosive load of several hundred kilos,” which were “the result of a deliberate act.” The blasts were so powerful, they said, that they measured 2.3 and 2.1 on the Richter scale, which is used to gauge earthquakes.

They warned that the gas plumes pose a risk to both sea and air traffic, and they instituted a navigation warning to ships to maintain a distance of at least 5 nautical miles, or 10 kilometers, from the leaks.

Danish, Swedish and German authorities are carrying out a joint investigation. Russia’s ambassador said Moscow would only accept the results of an independent investigation that included Russian experts.

NATO

On Thursday, NATO vowed retaliation for attacks on the critical infrastructure of its 30 member states.

“Any deliberate attack against allies’ critical infrastructure would be met with a united and determined response,” NATO ambassadors said in a statement.

The bloc said the four ruptures in the Nord Stream pipelines were of “deep concern” and agreed that current information pointed to “deliberate, reckless and irresponsible acts of sabotage.”

Two of the leaks are on the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, where the flow of gas was recently halted, while the other two are on Nord Stream 2, which has never been opened.

Although they were not in operation, both pipelines were filled with methane gas, which has escaped and is bubbling to the surface.
…